Information for 10795IIED

Humanitarian responses by local actors: Lessons learned from managing the transit of migrants and refugees through Croatia

The Croatian Government managed the transit of 650,000 migrants and refugees in late 2015 and early 2016 by coordinating the activities of an extensive number of international, national and local stakeholders to ensure quick and appropriate responses to these people’s needs.

The levels to which small local governments and communities were affected by the crisis and able to respond effectively were influenced by several factors. These included the rapid mobility of people in need of humanitarian assistance, the competency of local organisations that responded and the central government’s decisions about how to coordinate assistance. The response relied on local resources and communities in a major way but it spared local governments from bearing significant direct costs.

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Urban areas are increasingly the sites of humanitarian crises, from natural disasters to conflict and displacement. Through a programme of research, documenting and learning from experience and development of tools and approaches, IIED is working to build the knowledge and capacity to respond of humanitarian actors working in urban areas, and of urban actors facing humanitarian crises.